Depression: Law Enforcement Officers and Stress

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Depression is a psychological disorder that results from traumatic experiences that people encounter in life. National Institute of Mental Health explains that, “when a person has a depressive disorder, it interferes with daily life, normal functioning, and causes pain for both the person with the disorder and those who care about him or her” (2010, p.1).

Depression interferes with the normal life of a person as it results into lose of interest in activities, pessimism, fatigue, insomnia, irritability, persistent aches and feelings of hopelessness amongst other symptoms. Although there are many attributes of depression, traumatic experiences are the major causes of the depression in most people.

For instance, law enforcement officers experience traumatic incidences in the course of their duties such as frequent shootings, deaths, intimidation from the media and public, risking their lives, dangerous working environment and humiliating domestic violence amongst many other stressors. Since traumatic experiences relate with depression, does the trauma that law enforcement officers endure over the years make them susceptible to depression?

The traumatic experiences that the police officers encounter and endure during the course of their duties make them susceptible to depression. Depression is a psychological disorder that occurs mainly due to the traumatic experiences of life. Law enforcement community frequently encounters traumatic experiences that have contributed to high incidences of depression among the police officers signifying that trauma is the cause of depression.

Prevalence study carried out in Taiwan showed that about 21% of the law enforcement officers experience trauma. The study further revealed that the prevalence rates of depression are higher in men as compared with women because men have more responsibilities in terms of marriage and policing duties. However, the trauma and stressors that are inherent in the police profession contribute significantly to the police officers’ depression.

Leeds argue that, “police officers experience frequent and ongoing stressors in their work that range from cumulative stress – constant risk on the job, conflicting regulations, and public perceptions that may be inaccurate – to critical incidents: violent crimes, shootings and mass disasters” (2009, p. 4). All these stressors and traumatic experiences are potential causes of depression that have made police officers become susceptible to depressive trauma.

The police profession is emotionally stressing and physically dangerous thus eliciting depressive feelings that expose police officers to depression. Anderson argues that, “police have been tuned to dissociate from their emotions or suppress their emotions in order to be able to endure the scene, but chronic, long-term and cumulative stress takes its toll on police officers resulting into trauma syndrome” (1998, p.12).

The police officers endure traumatic experiences up to a point in life where they trigger overwhelming depressive feelings that cause depression. Although the police officers may tolerate many traumatic incidences such as witnessing the death of fellow police officer or ordeal of criminals, after a certain period such memories resurface to elicit depressive moods. This trend illustrates that traumatic experiences associated with policing cumulatively increase susceptibility of the police officers to depression.

Retirement studies of the police officers have shown that many of them suffer from depression caused by the traumatic memories related to the cumulative experiences, which occur throughout the police life.

Violanti argues that, “law enforcement officers experience varying forms of job-incurred trauma throughout their careers; residual effects can eventually create trauma during retirement as officers may develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder from carrying accumulated emotional baggage into their retirement years” (1997, p. 5).

Since traumatic experiences of policing have psychological residual effects that lead to depression, researchers recommend police officers to undergo psychological counseling and training before and after retiring in order to alleviate depressive trauma.

The objective of the research proposal is to establish whether the traumatic experiences that law enforcement officers encounter and endure over course of their profession make them susceptible to depression.

To establish the relationship between depression and traumatic experiences of the law enforcement officers, the study will focus on three groups of police officers; trainees, serving and retired as independent variables and examines psychological variables such as frustration, deprivation, and depression as dependent variables. The hypothesis of the study is; traumatic experiences that police officers encounter during the course of their profession are responsible for high prevalence rates of depression.

Proposed Methodology

The design of the methodology provides three groups of participants; trainee, serving, and retired police officers as independent variables. The objective of using three groups of participants is to find out the relationship between professional experience and the level of depression in police officers.

According to Kohli and Bajpai, the level of depression among police officers is proportional to their professional experiences (2006, p.8). Therefore, to prove the effect of professional experience on depression levels, it is imperative to measure psychological variables of depression, frustration and deprivation in trainee, serving and retired police officers.

The study requires random selection of 150 participants from a population of law enforcement officers in certain district or town. Since there are three groups, trainee, serving and retired police officers, each group should have 50 participants. The trainee police officers will serve as a control group in determining the nature and extent of depression among serving and retired police officers.

The selection of serving officers should be on the ones that have a minimum experience of 10 years in their profession while the retired police officers should be the ones who have not exceeded five years after retiring. In order to measure psychological variables, depression scale, frustration scale, and deprivation scale are essential in determining the levels of depression, frustration and deprivation respectively.

To collect relevant data in terms of questionnaires, researchers should ethically consider that participants need informed consent concerning the study and assurance that information obtained from them is confidential. Prior to the collection of data, the participants need to be in sober mood to enable them give the required information in the questionnaires.

References

Anderson, B. (1998). Trauma Response Profile. American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, 8, 1-15.

Kohli, K., & Bajpai, G. (2006). A Comparative Study of Frustration, Depression and Deprivation among Trainee and Serving Police Officials. Indian Journal of Criminology and Criminalistics, 27(3), 1-16.

Leeds, A. (2009). Police Officers’ Responses to Chronic Stress, Critical Incidents and Trauma. Law Enforcement Bulletin, 12, 1-8.

National Institute of Mental Health, (2010). Depression. United States Department of Health Services, 1-23.

Violanti, M. (1997). Residuals of Police Occupational Trauma. The Australasian Journal Of Disaster and Trauma Studies, 3(2), 1-8.

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Depression: Law Enforcement Officers and Stress

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